There's a new studio in town, and it's hoping to lend a hand to anyone making a game specifically in Unreal Engine.Fittingly named CodeDev: The Unreal Guys, the London-based studio was founded by chairman Rik Alexander, CEO Myke Parrott, and CTO Ryan Woodland. The three are positioning their new venture as a support studio.While co-developers are nothing new in games, it's not every day a studio announces its specializations in a particular engine. Epic Games' engine is updated and iterated upon on a consistent basis, so having a team to help with that lightens the production load.All three men have been in the industry from between 15 and 33 years, and previously worked at Climax Studios, Microsoft, and Bethesda. The company plans on tackling Unreal projects "of a…
CI Games already has a follow up to 2023's Lords of the Fallen in development, and PC-wise, that title will be exclusive to the Epic Games Store.Spotted by the likes of PCGamer, CI and Epic Games recently entered into a binding agreement for the 2026-bound game. Under it (in translated form), Epic has the "exclusive global distribution right" for the new title for its "entire product life cycle."For consoles, CI maintains the rights to publish Fallen's sequel on PlayStation 5 and Xbox Series X|S, and the entire IP overall. A more detailed agreement will be revealed separately in the coming weeks.The deal between CI and Epic sounds similar to one the latter had with Remedy and Quantic Dream. In 2019 as the EGS was getting off the ground, Epic courted those and …
The PlayStation Portal is getting a lot of usage from players, according to Sony. In its newest PlayStation Blog, the developer revealed some interesting statistics for its not-quite-handheld.From mid-November 2023 to early February, its most played games included PS exclusives Marvel's Spider-Man 2, Astro's Playroom, and God of War Ragnarok. On the multiplatform (and multiplayer) end were EA Sports FC 24 and Fortnite.Sony didn't give hard numbers but highlighted how much easier the Portal (or PSP) makes accessing games. Average Portal engagement shot up within the first two months of players using it.Remote play has been a good feature for PlayStation since it was introduced with the PlayStation 4. With the Portal, over 60 percent of players started using the feature for th…
Nearly a full month after the launch of its debut game, Venture to the Vine, Studio Cut to Bits has conducted layoffs.Per co-founder Masao Kobayashi, the Montreal studio lost most of its 10-person staff today, himself concluded. The cuts were due to "financial reasons," though it's unclear if these issues were longstanding or connected to Venture's launch."After 5 years of hard work on Venture to the Vile and the studio, it's hard to know what to say," he wrote.Cut to Bits was founded in late 2019 by Kobayashi and fellow co-founders Tommy Sagala and Paul Green. The three were previously Ubisoft alums who worked on titles like Far Cry 5 and Far Cry 6, and Rainbow Six Siege.At time of writing, it's unclear if Kobayashi was the only higher-up to be let …
The 2019 remake of Resident Evil 2 turned five years old back in January, and Capcom has now revealed it's the top seller in the survival horror franchise.As of March 31, 2024, the remake of the 1998 classic has sold over 13.9 million copies. Capcom revealed the milestone during a recent celebration for the game, and the studio's first in-game party for it."The positive feedback from everyone who has played the game is encouraging to all of our staff!" wrote Capcom in a translated post.
In July 2022, Resident Evil 2 had topped 10 million copies sold. Around that time, it had just been ported over to PlayStation 5 and Xbox Series X|S.
In recent years, Capcom's gradually been remaking the original Resident Evil sequels, each of which have done well commerci…
Over 600 game developers were surveyed by the Game Developer Collective in May 2024, and 59 percent of them collectively minced no words: the industry is is in a bad spot.Those surveyed were asked about present market conditions for the industry overall. 38 percent and 21 percent were respectively at "bad" and "very bad," while 26 percent stayed neutral and 13 percent found it "good.""Market conditions" in this instance refers to the industry's "unusually difficult commercial environment," such as its swaths of layoffs and closures, and the "financial difficulties" at studios that precede these events.When asked, 49 percent think conditions are likely to stay the same over the next six months. 19 percent believe things will g…
An extensive report from Bloomberg has pulled back the curtain on the troubled development of Suicide Squad: Kill the Justice League, the high-profile live-service dud from Batman Arkham developer Rocksteady and publisher Warner Bros. Games.It was already clear the project had rocky road to launch thanks to multiple delays and the fact Warner Bros. revealed it has taken a $200 million loss on the multiplayer shooter.Now, the full extent of the chaos has been laid bare. Almost two dozen sources told Bloomberg the project was hamstrung by a fluctuating vision, a rigid culture of perfectionism, and a live-service genre switch that clashed with the sensibilities of Rocksteady—which had previously cut its cloth making single-player experiences.It details how Rocksteady leaders began to parrot…
A pair of alum developers from Mediatonic have formed a new team, Kindred Spirit Games.As spotted by GamesIndustry, Megan Ralph and Joel Herber established the new studio at the start of 2024. The duo, according to Herber on LinkedIn, are already at work on their debut project.In addition to working at the Fall Guys studio as a lead client engineer (Herber) and level designer (Ralph), they were also coworkers at Summerhill creator Land & Sea.Separately, Ralph's worked at Ninja Theory, INT./Night, and Sony London. Herber's past experience includes Dream Reality and Plug-In Media.Interestingly, the Kindred Spirit website has no job postings. Likewise, neither Herber or Ralph have said they're looking to fill their ranks, which implies whatever they're working on is sm…
Following yesterday's Xbox showcase, Phil Spencer touched on the layoffs that occurred in May across Bethesda subsidiaries such as Tango Gameworks and Arkane Austin.Talking to IGN's Ryan McCaffrey, the Microsoft Gaming head acknowledged those reductions and closures as "very hard" on those affected. At the same time, he stressed that he must "run a sustainable business inside the company and grow," and made a tough call."Sometimes I have to make hard decisions that frankly are not decisions I love," he explained, "but decisions that somebody needs to go make."Spencer went on to explain that he's kept silent on the matter out of respect for those now laid off staff. While ensuring the "right thing" is being done with those emp…
Update (6/11/24): Timbre Games, a subsidiary under Sumo Group, has been closed down entirely.Now ex-employees from the studio broke the news on LinkedIn, with lead talent partner Jaclyn Adair revealing 80 people have been affected."We stood up for our beliefs and values and quickly made our mark on the industry," she wrote. "We had fun together and connected deeply. We were not without our growing pains, but we faced them head-on, transparently, together."Timbre was spun up in 2021, and served as an extension of Pipeworks Studios. Led by EA alum Joe Nickolls, the Vancouver studio was aiming to make action and simulation gamesOf Timbre and other studio closures, Adair said they "only serve short-term investments, and will, in the long term, degrade the quality and a…